According to our new State of Advertising Measurement Report implemented on behalf of Advertising Week, two out of three advertisers still aren’t sure what data they can rely on, no matter the source. This comes at a time – now more than ever – when advertisers need to base more marketing decisions, with more money at stake, on the accurate portrayal of audience and reporting of prior results.
With billions of dollars at stake, hundreds of companies now collect and analyze more data, on more parts of the consumer journey and advertising experience, than ever before. Yet advertisers can’t automate or optimize their marketing if they can’t rely on measurement data.
Advertisers give highest marks to the platforms that sell creatively using proven data resources.
For this new industry report, we delved deep into the state of measurement from the advertiser’s perspective. Over 375 exhaustive interviews later, we concluded that there’s a deeper, more destructive, level to the mistrust that jeopardizes all of advertising. Doubt is pervasive and patience is wearing thin. From ads that don’t cross the screen long enough to register to outright bot fraud, the entire digital ecosystem is under fire to verify its worth to the advertisers that pay for it all.
This is both a critical concern and an enormous opportunity for agencies and media brands. When we ask advertisers how they’re choosing their agency partners, for instance, good, credible, reliable data inevitably tops the list. Similarly, with media brands, advertisers give highest marks to the platforms that sell creatively using proven data resources.
Reliability and trust have become the new currency for successful media sellers. The easiest way to earn partner (rather than vendor) status is to solve a client’s real problem beyond the immediate campaign. No problem is bigger or deadlier than blurred vision on what’s real or what works and why. So while all media tout meaningful audiences, the few that can deliver more accurate, credible measurement will set themselves above the pack – and may even leapfrog seemingly bigger, more alluring audiences.
On Wednesday, September 27th, at 10:45 on the Tech Xperience stage, we’ll go through the full slate of findings – specifically, advertisers’ attitudes towards, confidence in, and usage of advertising data from audience measurement to advertising effectiveness, first-party to third-party to syndicated data. Then we’ll talk through the reasons, implications and new imperatives with research and strategy chiefs of Google, JPMorgan Chase, Publicis and Turner Broadcasting.
Like all industry change, there are many layers to unwind around data reliability. While we won’t solve them in one conversation, we will get it started by waking up to the reality of the crisis of confidence advertising confronts.